Good questions.

Colony is a local food network with two locations in West LA. Restaurants, caterers, bakers and food brands cook from a dedicated or hourly kitchen here, and the same network brings them customers: a walk-up market at each location, a group ordering and catering platform for offices (ordercolony.com), first-party delivery, and Colony Post, our market and shelf program inside office buildings. Join in any role and you’re plugged into all of it.

Santa Monica (11419 Santa Monica Blvd) and Venice (401 Lincoln Blvd).

A shared facility rents you space and stops there. Colony is the infrastructure around the space. Members get a dedicated kitchen, we take no commission on their third-party sales, and they get a sales channel: office group ordering, walk-up customers at both locations, delivery, and shelf space in Colony Post markets. A product that starts in an hourly R&D block can end up on an office-building shelf a few months later. That’s the point of the network.

Colony is founder-owned and operated. We opened our first location in 2019 and have run both locations ourselves since, so the people who sign your agreement are the people on site.

Everyone in the local food supply chain, and each one makes it better for the others. Hourly operators and CPG makers get a shot at local shelves. Restaurant members get native orders from offices and walk-ups. Landlords get the building that backs local food. Offices that order daily tell us what to bring in next. Small, local producers can’t get onto a Whole Foods or Erewhon shelf. They can get onto ours.

A mix of established restaurant brands, caterers, bakers and new concepts. Come by for a tour and meet some of them.

Yes, three ways. Walk into either location between 10am and 10pm and order from our members at the kiosk. Order ahead on ordercolony.com for pickup, group lunches and catering. Or find our partners on the major delivery apps. Whichever way you order, you can mix items from every brand in the building in one cart and one checkout.

We’re always interested in people who care about food and operations. Reach out through the contact page.

Use the contact form, or book a tour of either location and we’ll walk you through what fits.

A dedicated, licensed kitchen that is yours 24/7 for the length of your membership. No booking, no sharing the line. The kitchen comes shell-level: hood, sinks, gas and electrical connections, plus its own private cooler and access to the common coolers. You bring your cooking equipment, or rent equipment from us, and any additional fridges you need.

Santa Monica (11419 Santa Monica Blvd) and Venice (401 Lincoln Blvd). Both are West LA, minutes from the core delivery and catering demand.

Full-time memberships are a flat monthly fee that covers rent and all utilities, so there are no surprise bills. Pricing depends on kitchen size and location. Reach out and we’ll send current availability and rates.

Extra cold storage beyond your private cooler and the common coolers, and periodic hood duct cleaning, are billed separately. We’ll walk you through the full line-item list before you sign.

Standard terms are 12 months, with a deposit or a personal guarantee. Shorter and shared-kitchen arrangements come up from time to time, so ask.

Not on your third-party sales. Everything you sell through the delivery apps or your own channels is yours.

Colony holds the facility health permit. You operate under it with your own business license, seller’s permit (issued to the Colony address), food safety manager certificate, and general liability insurance naming Colony as additional insured. Whether you also need workers’ compensation depends on how your business is set up; we’ll walk you through it. We submit your paperwork to LA County Health; plan on about three weeks from complete paperwork to approval.

Yes. Colony runs an end-to-end operating system that integrates with every major third-party delivery service, so your orders from all of them land in one place. You can also sell through your own first-party website and keep those sales entirely yours. Through our partnership, Colony members can get a better Uber Eats commission rate than most restaurants can get on their own.

A sales channel. Members are listed on ordercolony.com, where West LA offices place daily group orders and catering; they sell at the walk-up market in each location; they can use Colony’s first-party delivery instead of paying the apps; and their grab-and-go product can go on the shelf at Colony Post markets inside office buildings. You also cook alongside other serious local brands, which is how collaborations, pop-ups and referrals happen. The kitchen is the entry point. The network is the reason to join.

A mix of established restaurant brands, caterers, bakers and emerging concepts. Come by for a tour and meet some of them.

If you have your business license and insurance ready, the health permit is the long pole at roughly three weeks. Members with their own equipment can be cooking within a month of signing.

Yes. Book a tour of either location and we’ll show you available kitchens, storage and the common areas, and talk through which kitchen fits your volume.

1. Tour a location and pick a kitchen.
2. Sign the Kitchen Station Membership Agreement and pay the deposit.
3. Send us your business license, seller’s permit (at the Colony address), food safety manager certificate and certificate of insurance naming Colony as additional insured.
4. We submit your health permit application to LA County and schedule the inspection.
5. Move your equipment in, complete onboarding, and start cooking.

The facility health permit, common-area cleaning, trash hauling, pest control, grease interceptor maintenance and scheduling of hood cleaning. You keep your own kitchen clean and bring your own smallwares, packaging and consumables.

No. Members bring their own packaging so it matches their brand. We provide bags at the counter for walk-up customers.

Each of our two Colony locations has a designated receiving area. Vendors deliver to the building and you bring product to your kitchen or storage.

Yes. Shelf and rack space in dry, refrigerated and frozen storage is available to operators who don’t need a kitchen. Ask us about availability.

Yes. Kitchens are shell-level by design so you can lay them out for your menu. We can advise on equipment layout and help with health-department drawings as part of onboarding.

Kitchens start around 200 sq ft and go up from there. Shared kitchens and larger multi-kitchen setups come up from time to time, so tell us your volume and we’ll match you.

Because your kitchen is dedicated to you, allergen control is much easier than in a shared line. Certification requirements vary by program, so talk to us before you apply.

Restaurant service, catering, baked goods, meal prep, beverages and packaged goods for wholesale or retail. If it’s a recognized food product that LA County permits in a shared facility, it almost certainly works here.

Ask us. Requirements depend on the product and the kitchen, and we’ll tell you up front whether it’s workable.

Yes, and more directly than a feature on social media. Members are in front of office buyers on ordercolony.com, in front of walk-up customers at both locations, and in front of hundreds of office workers a day through Colony Post. When an office tells us they want more of a certain kind of food, we go find or grow it among our members. Being in the network is the marketing.

No. Your kitchen is yours 24/7 and you set your own hours. Members who sell through ordercolony.com agree on a lunch-service schedule so customers can count on them.

Yes. Member and vendor parking is available at both locations.

Anyone who needs a licensed commercial kitchen without a full-time commitment: caterers with event spikes, bakers on overnight schedules, meal-prep businesses, packaged-goods makers, food trucks that need a commissary, and concepts testing demand before going full-time. It’s also the on-ramp into the Colony network: what you make here can be sold here.

$78 an hour pay as you go, or as low as $34/h on a monthly plan. The rate covers the kitchen, utilities and access to the shared facility, with no long-term lease.

Once you’re an approved member, you reserve blocks through Colony’s booking system. Book ahead for peak slots (weekday mornings and pre-event days fill first); overnight and off-peak blocks are usually wide open.

Yes. Hourly members get their own health permit from LA County, alongside a business license, a seller’s permit at the Colony address, a food safety manager certificate, and general liability insurance naming Colony as additional insured. Allow about three weeks for the permit.

Yes. Shelf space in shared refrigerated and frozen storage is available, along with dry storage and small-equipment lockers on request. The kitchen comes fully equipped with the cooking line; you bring your smallwares, knives and packaging.

Hourly members go through a one-time onboarding (permits, insurance, facility training), which is why we don’t offer drop-in bookings. There’s a $35 application fee, paid only after you’re approved, and a $500 refundable deposit.

Our two Colony locations run 24/7. Overnight blocks are a popular choice for bakers and prep-heavy operators.

Yes, for prep, storage and water fill. Trucks can park on site and fill up, but we don’t offer waste disposal, so plan on a separate dump station for grey water and grease.

Yes, and many members do. Hourly time is the easiest way to prove out volume before committing to a dedicated kitchen. We’ll credit the onboarding you’ve already completed.

Yes. This is the part most shared facilities can’t offer. Hourly members making grab-and-go, snacks, drinks, baked goods or packaged products can be stocked at the walk-up market in our two Colony locations and on the shelves of Colony Post markets inside office buildings. Getting onto a Whole Foods or Erewhon shelf as a small local producer is nearly impossible. Getting onto a Colony shelf starts with a conversation during onboarding. Operators with a steady schedule can also list on ordercolony.com for group orders and catering.

1. Fill out the hourly application and tour the location.
2. Sign the Facility Agreement and pay the deposit.
3. Apply for your health permit with LA County. Allow about three weeks.
4. Send us your health permit, business license, seller’s permit, food safety manager certificate and certificate of insurance.
5. Set up your booking account and reserve your first block.

Hourly is booked by the block with no long-term commitment, best for testing, event prep and part-time production. Full-time is a dedicated kitchen that’s yours around the clock, best for daily service, delivery and steady volume. Many members start hourly and move up.

A fully equipped, licensed kitchen: the hood and the cooking line, sinks and prep space. Bring your own smallwares, knives and packaging.

Yes. Hourly blocks are a popular choice for menu development, product testing, tastings, food photography and filming. Members can also book space for small events; ask us about availability.

No. Book what you need. Longer and recurring bookings get better rates.

Colony Post is a food amenity we set up inside your building: a lobby market café staffed for the lunch peak, grab-and-go kiosks the rest of the day, and daily group ordering for the floors above from Colony members and curated neighborhood restaurants. One footprint that feeds the whole building.

Because food is the amenity tenants notice every day, and because of what the food is. Colony Post stocks products from local restaurants, bakers and makers who cook at our two Colony locations, many of them small brands that can’t get onto a big grocery shelf. A building with Colony Post is easier to lease and renew, gives employees a reason to come in, and makes you the landlord who backs local food entrepreneurs instead of the one with a vending wall. Your tenants’ lunch dollars go into the local food economy and come back as a better amenity.

Single-operator lobby cafés fail on menu fatigue and thin lunch windows. Colony rotates product from a roster of established local brands and layers group ordering on top, so the space earns from the whole building, not just walk-ups. We’re a licensed food-service management company, not a single restaurant.

From the Colony network. Restaurant members supply hot food and grab-and-go, hourly operators and local makers supply snacks, baked goods, drinks and packaged products, and Colony’s own culinary team fills the gaps. What your tenants buy tells us what to stock next, so the mix in your building gets sharper the longer it runs.

A space we can bring to health-department spec (a small no-hood kitchen and display refrigeration is plenty), plus a partner on the tenant side: email access, floor signage and a tenant discount program. The more a building promotes the market, the faster it takes off.

Every building is different. We’ll model your building’s traffic and come back with a concept and a proposed structure; typically the landlord supports launch and Colony operates. We’re happy to talk through options on a call.

Colony hires, trains and manages the on-site team, holds the health permit, and carries general liability coverage naming the building as additional insured.

Buildings and campuses with a few hundred or more people a day, especially those that allow outside customers. Smaller buildings can work as a kiosk-only or group-ordering-only program.

Send us the floor plan, the current food setup (if any) and your daily badge-in count. We’ll come back with a concept for your building.

One daily order for your whole team from a rotating menu of Colony member restaurants and nearby favorites, delivered to your floor in a single drop. Everyone picks their own meal from any brand, it all goes through one checkout, and you get one invoice.

Set up a house account on ordercolony.com, invite your team, and set a daily budget per person if you want one. Employees order by 10am and lunch arrives together by noon. Teams that order consistently get priority on a fixed daily drop-off slot.

No minimums. You pay menu prices plus delivery, with no platform subscription. Orders for 25 or more people get free delivery.

Yes. Office orders are the demand signal for the whole network. When your team keeps ordering a certain cuisine or asking for something we don’t have, we bring in restaurant members and local makers to fill it. Ordering through Colony isn’t just lunch; it’s a vote on what gets made in West LA next.

Yes. Fund a daily or weekly stipend per employee, and anything they spend over it goes on their own card.

Same platform. Order trays, boxed lunches and breakfast spreads from Colony members, scheduled for the time you need them.

Yes. Because each person orders individually, vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free and halal options are built in rather than bolted on.

Santa Monica, Venice, Brentwood, Playa Vista, Culver City and the rest of West LA. Ask if you’re on the edge of that.

Yes. Your house account works both for group orders upstairs and at the market downstairs, so one lunch budget covers both.

If you ordered through ordercolony.com, call the Colony location that fulfilled it. Offices on a consistent daily order get VIP status, which includes a dedicated concierge available around the clock.

Tell us your headcount, address and the days you’d like to feed the team, and we’ll set up your account and a first order.